Pioneer DEH-1500 Car CD Player
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- Anti-Theft Protection: Detachable Face Panel
- Player Type: CD
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Excellent mid-range head unit
Pros
Relatively inexpensive. Great power, extremely durable. Great FM tuner.
Cons
Bright faceplate with no way to dim, Occasionally hard-to-understand directions.
Recommended it?
Yes
The Bottom Line:
I would recommend this to someone looking for a midrange HU. It is a good deal for the price you can get it. Slightly confusing directions...
I purchased this head unit over 2 years ago when I first started driving. It has given me the most trouble-free two years I've ever had with any piece of electronics. I've moved it between three different vehicles and it has always performed well (save for one vehicle, which I will get into later).
The first vehicle it was installed in was a 1994 Plymouth Voyager minivan. It powered two Pioneer 6 1/2" speakers and two Blaupunkt 6x9 speakers at once. I never had a complaint with the driving capability of the head unit, and any distortion I heard was due to my cheaper Blaupunkt speakers. I really think they just couldn't handle the extra power.
When I initially purchased the head unit, I paid around $200 out the door for it with a mounting kit, wiring kit, and a 2 year no-questions-asked warranty from Circuit City. I paid a little more, but I had the peace of mind that my investment would at least last me 2 years :-).
The next car I put it in was a 1986 Mazda 626 sedan. While it sounded okay, the car had some serious power issues that really kept the head unit from performing. Any little bit of bass would cause the faceplate to dim and the speakers to distort. Again, this was not an issue with the head unit, it was all the cars problem. Also, this was the only car of the three that I attempted to wire the car in without actually just using pre-made plugs. Needless to say, I had problems with the HU not retaining settings when I turned the key off. Eventually I got it figured out, but it was very frustrating. I would always recommend that you buy adapters specific for your vehicle.
After I got rid of that heap of potentially flaming junk car, I got my current 1994 Ford Ranger XLT x-cab pickup truck. Simply put, this is my favorite install out of all of them. I have the head unit driving four Polk Audio db570 (5x7) coaxial speakers at full range. They can pound with the best of them, even without subs. With this trucks 95 amp alternator, the head unit has plenty of power to suck down when it needs to drive to peak output. I see very little dimming of the head unit at high volumes, and have never really heard it distort.
Several people have commented on the lack of a rotary volume control. I do agree that rotary would be faster when you want to quickly kill the volume, but when listening to a CD, I'll just hit the pause button (provided I hear the cell phone ring at all). I, too, was confused by the manual's directions on how to set the clock. So much so that I just forget about the clock altogether.
The face plate is bright. In fact, it's a little too bright at night. After a while, you get used to it, but it's still kind of distracting at night. That was one of my few complaints: it doesn't have a dimmer control, not even a manual one.
The FM tuner on the head unit brought in stations I didn't know were even available in my area. Though I don't listen to radio much, it's nice to have that option when I get tired of my own CDs. The HU will scan through your tuner and pick out the stations with the best signal, and then add them to the presets, too. It also has FM1 and FM2 presets, so you can have two totally different sets of presets for different locations. I used this when I was making frequent trips to the Philadelphia area. I would use FM1 for my home stations and FM2 for the Philly stations. It was a very useful feature.
I would also like to comment on the skip protection. I don't know what Pioneer uses, but they do it right, that's for sure. Even on the roughest of PA-80 and the back roads around my house, I've only gotten this head unit to skip a handful of times. Half of that handful were times when I didn't even have the HU properly installed in the car and it was just flopping around in a hole in the dash (forgive me... it was one of those where I just had to take it for a drive before I finished installing it).
To sum up my review, I would recommend this HU to just about anyone. It's been able to withstand all of the abuse that I put it through, including being hooked up wrong and being woefully underpowered. The next head unit I buy will be a comparable model from Pioneer, but perhaps one supporting MP3 playback.
The first vehicle it was installed in was a 1994 Plymouth Voyager minivan. It powered two Pioneer 6 1/2" speakers and two Blaupunkt 6x9 speakers at once. I never had a complaint with the driving capability of the head unit, and any distortion I heard was due to my cheaper Blaupunkt speakers. I really think they just couldn't handle the extra power.
When I initially purchased the head unit, I paid around $200 out the door for it with a mounting kit, wiring kit, and a 2 year no-questions-asked warranty from Circuit City. I paid a little more, but I had the peace of mind that my investment would at least last me 2 years :-).
The next car I put it in was a 1986 Mazda 626 sedan. While it sounded okay, the car had some serious power issues that really kept the head unit from performing. Any little bit of bass would cause the faceplate to dim and the speakers to distort. Again, this was not an issue with the head unit, it was all the cars problem. Also, this was the only car of the three that I attempted to wire the car in without actually just using pre-made plugs. Needless to say, I had problems with the HU not retaining settings when I turned the key off. Eventually I got it figured out, but it was very frustrating. I would always recommend that you buy adapters specific for your vehicle.
After I got rid of that heap of potentially flaming junk car, I got my current 1994 Ford Ranger XLT x-cab pickup truck. Simply put, this is my favorite install out of all of them. I have the head unit driving four Polk Audio db570 (5x7) coaxial speakers at full range. They can pound with the best of them, even without subs. With this trucks 95 amp alternator, the head unit has plenty of power to suck down when it needs to drive to peak output. I see very little dimming of the head unit at high volumes, and have never really heard it distort.
Several people have commented on the lack of a rotary volume control. I do agree that rotary would be faster when you want to quickly kill the volume, but when listening to a CD, I'll just hit the pause button (provided I hear the cell phone ring at all). I, too, was confused by the manual's directions on how to set the clock. So much so that I just forget about the clock altogether.
The face plate is bright. In fact, it's a little too bright at night. After a while, you get used to it, but it's still kind of distracting at night. That was one of my few complaints: it doesn't have a dimmer control, not even a manual one.
The FM tuner on the head unit brought in stations I didn't know were even available in my area. Though I don't listen to radio much, it's nice to have that option when I get tired of my own CDs. The HU will scan through your tuner and pick out the stations with the best signal, and then add them to the presets, too. It also has FM1 and FM2 presets, so you can have two totally different sets of presets for different locations. I used this when I was making frequent trips to the Philadelphia area. I would use FM1 for my home stations and FM2 for the Philly stations. It was a very useful feature.
I would also like to comment on the skip protection. I don't know what Pioneer uses, but they do it right, that's for sure. Even on the roughest of PA-80 and the back roads around my house, I've only gotten this head unit to skip a handful of times. Half of that handful were times when I didn't even have the HU properly installed in the car and it was just flopping around in a hole in the dash (forgive me... it was one of those where I just had to take it for a drive before I finished installing it).
To sum up my review, I would recommend this HU to just about anyone. It's been able to withstand all of the abuse that I put it through, including being hooked up wrong and being woefully underpowered. The next head unit I buy will be a comparable model from Pioneer, but perhaps one supporting MP3 playback.
